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Updated: Reno City Council selects company to install single-spaced digital parking meters

Updated: 3:25 p.m.: The Reno City Council voted 7-0 today to start negotiations with San Diego-based IPS Group, Inc., to install single-space parking meters that accept credit cards and coins in downtown Reno.

A final contract with the company is expected to be presented in December with the first phase of installations starting in February. IPS was one of six firms that applied to install parking meters in Reno.

Public Works Director John Flansberg said the city would lease to own the meters over the course of five years with no interest. The total cost is still subject to negotiations.

The IPS Group meters are single-spaced meters that accept credit cards and coins and have been installed in cities such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Scranton, Penn., Brookline, Mass and Newark, N.J. The company has installed 120,000 meters around the country.
"This is the single space credit card leader," Flansberg said. "This is what's used. "
He added the Reno area has lots of tourism marketing in the San Francisco area and "this is what they're used to in the Bay Area."
The city's previous contract with Reno-based Curb System was terminated in July after the company's parking kiosks failed to meet the city's standards. Those kiosks will be removed by Nov. 9 under a settlement agreement approved by the City Council at today's meeting.
Under agreement, Curb will pay for the kiosk removal and released the city from all its claims.
The city's current coin-based meters can be retrofitted with the IPS technology, which will be powered with solar panels on the back of each individual meter.
The city plans to initially buy 898 meters, which would cover most of downtown. The city would also use some of its remaining older coin-based meters in areas with less parking demand.
Here's an example of the IPS Group meters in action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iz2k6CQhNoM